


In The Dark Night of the Soul

by ladyarcherfan3



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Identity Issues, M/M, Religious Guilt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-10-15
Packaged: 2020-12-16 14:29:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21037742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyarcherfan3/pseuds/ladyarcherfan3
Summary: After the averted Apocalypse and the trials in Heaven and Hell, Aziraphale struggles with the question of who he is now.  Crowley is there to support him.





	In The Dark Night of the Soul

It was several months after the Apocalypse-that-wasn’t, and much like the immediate aftermath, there were some subtle but significant changes.

Rather than break a well-worn habit, it was easy for Crowley and Aziraphale to keep meeting. In fact, they saw more of each other than before. But since there was no new Arrangement, much less saving the world, the time between them had a whole new flavor that held elements of something more casual and more intimate. It was new, and terrifying in some regards, but it was also the shape of what had been building between them for six thousand years.

Their increased time and proximity to each other make Crowley dismiss the changes to Aziraphale’s mood and behavior as something that he just never had the chance to see before. But the longer they spent together, the more it began to worry him. At the bookshop, he’d futz on his phone while Aziraphale drank a never cooling cup of tea and read, as usual. But there was a lack of the pleased humming and muttering about one thing or another that he associated with a contented Aziraphale.

And a new - awful, wonderful - habit started of Crowley spending nights with Aziraphale, in the rarely used bedroom above the shop. It usually ended up with Crowley sleeping and Aziraphale sitting next to him reading, but they certainly didn’t limit themselves to that. As time went on, however, Crowley would wake up in the middle of the night to see Aziraphale not reading - his gaze would be distant, brow furrowed in deep thought. More than once, Aziraphale would also have Crowley’s hand in his, thumb stroking over sharp knuckles like a repetitive prayer. But any attempt to bring it up with the angel would lead nowhere but assurances that he was fine, with smiles that were hollow in the center.

Crowley recognized some the symptoms. He’d been dealing with trauma and questions since his fall, and had gotten rather good at dealing with it. Or compartmentalizing it. (There was a box in his brain marked, “lost my best friend”, but since said best friend wasn’t lost anymore - to a bookshop fire or to Hell - there was no reason to deal with it, right?) He wasn’t sure what was bothering Aziraphale, exactly - the near Apocalypse, the whole trial ordeal - so he just kept an eye on the angel. It wasn’t like he would know how to bring it up or help him, anyway.

One day, apropos of nothing, Aziraphale asked, “Crowley. Am… Am I horrible for missing them… missing it?” Aziraphale didn’t look at him directly, but stood in the center of the floor. He twisted the golden ring on his pinkie, face pinched.

The day was actually fair and sunny, and Crowley was surprised and a bit worried that Aziraphale hadn’t demanded a walk down to St. James's to feed the ducks and take in the weather. Instead, he shrugged off Crowley’s suggestion and paced around the bookshop. He opened books and closed them again after five minutes of stalled out reading, pulled others off the shelf only to put them back immediately. The tea went cold in the cup. Crowley sprawled on his favorite chair - miracled closer to a window so he could soak up the sunshine that way - and watched Aziraphale over the top of his phone while he lost round after round of Candy Crush.

Crowley lowered the phone carefully and took a deep breath. “Missing who and what?” he asked, instead of spouting the first quip that came to his mind. _I prefer you a bit horrible, you know._

Aziraphale gestured upwards, a short, stabbing motion. “The angels, Heaven. It was fine for a while, quite freeing actually. But now I just feel… out of balance.”

“Angel, you’ve been doing everything you could _not_ to be sent back upstairs and tried to avoid dealing with the angels for millenia. And now you don’t have to go back.”

“Unless they decided to come to take one or both of us again!” he cried. “But even if they do leave us alone, nothing makes sense any more!”

Crowley’s stomach dropped and left a cold pit behind. Did that all encompassing negative include them, include him?

Aziraphale didn’t notice if any change showed on Crowley’s face. He made an aborted attempt to pace, but he never made it more than a few steps in any direction. Frustration and fear boiled off him in waves. The fingers twisting his ring started to claw; the skin of his little finger went red.

“I haven’t agreed or wanted to really be with the other angels for a long time now, that is true. But I am still an angel, correct? And I can’t completely forsake everything I was. Everything I was made to be, everything I built my life around is based on me being an angel. Even avoiding going back, dodging Gabriel as much as possible, just living my life as I wanted, being with you, it was all framed around being an angel. Or, at least, being an angel as I saw it, not as Gabriel and Michael and the others see it. I followed the spirit of God’s plan, if not the letter of it. But if I am not allowed back to Heaven as is, and considered a traitor by my siblings, am I still an angel? What am I? Who am I?”

He collapsed onto his chair, face hidden by his hands, entire frame shaking. “_Who am I_?”

Crowley slid across the space between them and knelt next to his chair. He wasn’t sure if he could or even should touch him in comfort and to ground him. The loss and pain radiating off of Aziraphale echoed in harmony with some of his old pains, bringing them to the surface. They could both shatter at the wrong touch, the wrong words, at that moment. But he risked it and said the truest thing he knew.

“You’re still Aziraphale.”

It took a moment, but Aziraphale looked up at him. His eyes were red rimmed, face crumpled. “Thank you, dear. But…” he fought to find the right words. “I feel as if I have gained so much - such a feeling of freedom! To know that the world and everything I love about it is still here, that I can experience my favorites and everything I haven’t yet. Even the threat of the angels coming back for me is less terrifying, because I know that you stand with me, and I with you.” He grasped Crowley’s hands between the two of his. “I can’t regret any of this. But I still feel hollowed out in a way. Unsettled. Such a large part of my foundation is gone. Or have I moved away from it? And if I am moving away, does that mean I am leaving behind what is right and true for an angel? And if I am, what is stopping Her from casting me down?”

The grip on Crowley’s hand threatened to break bone, but he didn’t notice it. “You didn’t move away from what it meant to be an angel, thossse other bastardsss did.” Hisses slipped into his words, as he fought to keep himself in control but not to hide his vehement belief in Aziraphale. “You told me you outright lied to Her about your ssssword in Eden, and she didn’t cast you down then. You’ve always loved humanity, which seems to hold a lot of ssssway with Her. You got me to do more bits of good than I would have ever considered on my own, even before I Fell. That has to the core of what being an angel is, what She laid as the foundation. You, bit of a bastard as you can be, are still good. You’re still you.”

“I know, I know, but I am still terrified.” Aziraphale’s eyes went distant again, with a wave of pain that Crowley hoped to never see again. “Why hasn’t She said or done anything? If the others are off the mark, or I am in the wrong, where is She?” His voice dropped to a faint whisper. “Why hasn’t she spoken to any of us in so long?”

Anger gone, Crowley touched Aziraphale’s shoulder, and when he looked up, he tightened his grip, a grounding force. “I don’t know. If I had answers, I wouldn’t have been asking questions to begin with. I do know that we are on our own side, and it seems to be the right one. As much as anything can be right.” He took a careful breath and swallowed hard. “I’ll be here as long as you want me to while you figure everything out.”

Aziraphale blinked away tears and smiled. It was a particularly soft and glowing expression that made Crowley’s chest ache. “I hope you plan to stay long past me figuring anything out, if I ever do.”

Crowley shrugged, just a hit of his careless nonchalance leaking through. “Eh, I waited six thousand years to get where we are now. Don’t think I’ll be leaving anytime sooner than that. And - and I still have my own questions. It seems like it will be easier if we stand with each other for this, going forward.”

“Gladly. I am so very glad. To have one constant while I feel so adrift. I am glad it is you, and I hope I can be that steady place for you, as well.”

Crowley allowed Aziraphale to draw him close after a heart beat’s hesitation- old habits of wanting but never allowing himself to have were hard to break. The angel pressed a kiss to his forehead, a thanks, a blessing. Crowley melted into the embrace and returned it.

There would never be an end to the questions, never a break in the search for answers. But in that moment in the bookshop, both Crowley and Aziraphale had the answers to a least a few of them.

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to glorious_clio again for her beta work. This is also a work where I projected heavily onto Aziraphale as I am also going through a struggle to reconcile the religion of my childhood and most of adult life, with how I see the world and myself now.


End file.
